


no headlights

by teasockschocolate



Series: Carlwheeler Appreciation Week [5]
Category: The Greatest Showman (2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, as in them as kiddos, baby carlwheeler, but theres a tWIST, muahahaha
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 17:05:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17063666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teasockschocolate/pseuds/teasockschocolate
Summary: “Hey!” A sharp voice broke his spell. “You’re in my tree.”Phillip squinted down to make out the silhouette of a figure standing about ten feet below him; a young girl with her hands on her hips.“What?” He frowned.“”S’okay.” She reached up and pulled herself up with far more grace that he had. “I’ll just join ya.”





	no headlights

**Author's Note:**

> so this is TECHNICALLY being posted on day 6 but it's barely after midnight where I am so it counts for day 5 lol whoops kids

The city gets the most quiet at about 3 am. The only sound is the occasional siren wailing down the street and a few stray car horns blaring at God knows what.

Phillip had learned through trial and error of coming out at various times when the roof shaking scream matches became too much; he’d begun to slink through the deserted streets with his head down, a black hoodie encasing his face. 

The park closed at dusk, but the only thing keeping it blocked off was a single chain which could easily be stepped over by someone even shorter than he was. It had become a place of refuge where he’d take advantage of the rare and wonderful silence that came with the dead of night when everyone of sound mind was safe and warm in bed.

Tonight, Phillip’s tongue and cheek had earned him a swift box to the ears and he’d ran before it escalated any further. His parents would never follow him into the street, less they risk their pristine reputation. They could handle the talk of having one rouge son, but chasing him into the street to beat said son to a pulp was something they could not so easily come back from.

He had found a tree in a clump towards the center of the park with branches just low enough for him to hoist himself upon and frequent enough to carry him high above the grass below. His head leaned against the bark, eyes shut, breathing in the cool air around him. He pretended he was in the country, where he’d never been but read about, and was a farm boy drifting off in the serenity of nature.

“Hey!” A sharp voice broke his spell. “You’re in my tree.”

Phillip squinted down to make out the silhouette of a figure standing about ten feet below him; a young girl with her hands on her hips. 

“What?” He frowned.“

”S’okay.” She reached up and pulled herself up with far more grace that he had. “I’ll just join ya.”

“Oh,” Phillip shifted uncomfortably. “That’s okay, I was just leaving.”

“No, you weren’t.” She easily scrambled up the tree past him and he was vaguely reminded of a squirrel do the same thing last week. “So,” She said casually, drawing circles in the air with her toes. “Whatcha doing in my tree?”

“I can go, I’m sorry I didn’t realize it was… yours.”

The girl shrugged again. “It’s not. Just come here most nights.”

“Me too.”

“Why?”

Phillip glanced around awkwardly. All he’d wanted was to sit in silence for a little. Not have a heart to heart with a stranger in a tree.

“You don’t have to answer if it’s some big thing.” The girl relieved him. “I just come here ‘cause I like to climb and there’s no one here this late. Well, usually.”

“You’re allowed to be out this late?”

She scoffed. “’Course not. You?”

The corners of his mouth twitched. “’Course not.” He echoed.

A strangely companionable silence fell between them for a few moments.

“Well, I can letcha have the tree tonight.” The girl hopped down to a branch level with his and in the pale light of nearby streetlamp and the moon, she seemed rather pretty. Her eyes were dark and held a sparkle, like a dust of starlight. 

“Anne.” She stuck out her hand to his.

“Phillip.”

“See you around, Phillip.”

He didn’t see Anne again for a couple weeks. He tried to keep an eye out in school and on the streets, but what was he even looking for? He hadn’t even seen her in the light; all he was working with was a thirteen-or-so-year-old girl with brown eyes named Anne. The odds were against him.

He continued to loiter in the park, but steered clear of “her tree.” While part of him wanted to see her again, he didn’t know what he would even say. “Hey, remember that one time we talked for two minutes in a tree at three am? That was cool.” Maybe not.

He’d started to bring a book with him and would pour over pages in a different tree, lighting the words with the flashlight of his phone. The stories he got lost in were a welcome escape from the suffocating world around him and he wished he’d thought of this ages ago.

“Trying to get mugged?” A voice called from below him, sending a jolt of nerves down his spine.

“Anne?” He shone his light to the ground and was now able to make out her standing at the foot of the tree. She wore cuffed jeans and a long grey sweatshirt that she tugged at absently. Wild curls framed her thin face with reckless abandon, and her eyes were amber in the light. Despite her face immediately wrinkling into a grimace as she squeezed her eyes shut and waved the light away, Phillip was suddenly very aware that she was extremely pretty.

“Watch it!”

"Sorry,” He quickly turned off the light. “Um, what’s up?”

“What’s up? What’s up with you and that stupid light in the middle of the night.”

“Uh, I’m reading?”

He could hear her snort from the ground. “Gotta come way out here to do that?”

“It’s quiet.”

“Still. Dangerous.”

“Why?”

“You stupid or something?”

His cheeks burned. “No,”

“Not everyone else is out here like us to just get some peace, Phillip.” Though he couldn’t see her well, he had a strong suspicion she was rolling her eyes. 

“Oh,”

“Mind if I come up?”

“Wouldn’t you even if I said no?”

“Touche.”He felt a trace of a smile again as her curly head bobbed into view and then past, seating herself a branch above him.

“What part of town you from?” She crossed her ankles.

“The Village.”

“Greenwich?”

“Yeah.” A low whistle answered him.

“What about you?”

“Not there,” She laughed. “Further east.”

“Hm,” He said, not sure how to continue a conversation.

“So, what’s your family do where you can live there?”

Phillip cleared his throat awkwardly. “My dad, he’s a senator.”

“Oh, wow.”

“Yeah. I don’t really… I… Let’s not talk about him.”

“Okay.” Her snarky tone thus far turned a touch more gentle. 

They fell into another lapse of silence.

“So. What’re you reading?”

Phillip sheepishly held up the cover. His ears burned when she snorted.

“A soulmate book?”

Phillip shrugged, feeling the heat from his ears spreading to his cheeks, then his neck. His left thumb subconsciously rolled over his right index finger where a red feather, the size of an almond, was seared into his skin. It’d been there since the day he’d been born, the universe’s way of telling him once again exactly what he had to be. Everyone had their soulmate. Whether it be a matching mark, first words they would speak to them, their name, a timer counting down to when they met, there was something on everyone’s body that paired them for life with another. 

“I mean, I don’t know if I really believe it,”

Her head cocked to the side. “Why not?”

“Well, my parents are ‘soulmates’ and look where that led them.”

“Where?”

Oh, right. She didn’t know his parents, his life. He relished that feeling of anomynity for a brief moment.

“Nowhere good.”

Anne hummed.

“You believe in them?”

“Look, I’m sorry ‘bout your parents, but it works out most other times. I think it must be great to have someone so right for you, the universe is rooting for you.”

This conversation was getting pretty deep pretty fast, but Phillip didn’t find himself really minding. “I don’t want to love someone just ‘cause the world’s telling me to.

“So you’re really against all this?”

“Yep.”

“Huh.”

“So what’s yours?” Phillip subconsciously drew his index finger over his mark.

“My what?”

“Your mark. Or whatever it is for your soulmate.”

Anne was quiet for a few seconds. “Don’t have one.”

“Really?”

Anne turned her head and in the dim light he could see her eyes flash.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing. I’m just surprised. With the way you just talked about them.”

“It’s not for me, but I want it for other people.”

Phillip was stunned for a moment, considering that that may possibly be the most selfless thing he’d ever heard. He wanted to say something profound in response; some way to remark on that in a suave way. But instead, he said “Oh.”

Anne smiled awkwardly. “So, since we’re not soulmates and tied in a horrible twisted fate… friends?” She stuck out her hand with a mocking seriousness.

He laughed. “Friends.”

As he shook this strange tree-girl’s hand, Phillip was dimly aware that this may be the weirdest and most sincere way he had ever made a friend.

**Author's Note:**

> so i'm considering continuing this later on?? let me know if you'd want more of it


End file.
